Chloe Cole Act federal legislation blocks gender procedures for minors

A Republican lawmaker is teaming up with Chloe Cole, an outspoken detransitionist, to push federal legislation that would block gender-based medical procedures for minors, saying children are being rushed into receiving life-changing treatments.

The Chloe Cole Act was introduced Monday as federal legislation aimed at protecting minors from gender-related medical procedures.

Rep. Bob Onder, R-Mo., who spearheaded the bill, has a medical degree and is sounding the alarm about the impact gender-based treatment can have on minors. The congressman told Fox News Digital that his bill would not only protect minors from such treatment, but also give children and parents the right to hold medical professionals accountable in court.

“We know that over the last 15 years, the transgender movement has convinced tens of thousands of boys and girls that they were born in the wrong bodies…And then a chain of transgender clinics exploited these children for ideology and for profit and actually caused permanent damage to the health of these children with wrong sex hormones, puberty blockers and even mutilating surgeries,” Onder told Fox News Digital.

Chloe Cole speaks during a press conference at the Capitol in Washington, DC on September 20, 2022. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

The congressman said the Chloe Cole Act stems from President Donald Trump’s January 2025 order titled “Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation.” The order encourages lawmakers to “work to develop, propose, and promote legislation to enact a private right of action for children and parents of children whose healthy body parts have been damaged by medical professionals performing chemical and surgical mutilation.” The order noted that statutes of limitations for these cases are expected to be “long.”

Cole, who has become a prominent advocate for detransition, told Fox News Digital that the legislation is “a critical step in our mission to ensure that no minor in America suffers the kind of lasting and irreparable harm that I suffered.”

“While we have made significant progress in raising awareness and adopting protective measures in recent years, the fight is far from over. Too many children remain at risk of irreversible damage from puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgical procedures forced on them before they can fully understand the consequences,” Cole said in a statement provided exclusively to Fox News Digital.

“We must finish what we started and protect the next generation from these experimental and barbaric treatments,” she added.

Chloe Cole, who detransitioned after medical procedures, warns others to wait and seek support from family before transitioning, shared her story with Fox News Digital. (Fox News Digital)

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A recent court ruling in New York has given advocates like Cole some hope in holding medical providers accountable. Recently, a jury awarded $2 million in damages to Fox Varian, 22, after she sued a plastic surgeon who performed a double mastectomy on her when she was a teenager. Varian’s lawsuit also targeted his psychologist. The New York Times noted that Varian claimed the 2019 double mastectomy left her disfigured. Varian, like Cole, was born female and was at one point identified as male. She is currently undergoing the detransition process.

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has previously expressed support for providing minors with gender-related medical treatment.

“The AAP and other major medical organizations – including the American Medical Association, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and the World Health Organization – support transgender adolescents’ access to the health care they need,” a 2023 AAP statement read. “The AAP opposes any law or regulation that discriminates against transgender and gender diverse people, or that interferes with the doctor-patient relationship.”

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Chloe Cole, who spoke about receiving transitional medical care when she was a teenager, is greeted by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene during a news conference outside the U.S. Capitol on September 20, 2022. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

Cole celebrated the ruling and said in a Fox News Digital op-ed: “There are so many other young people like us. Doctors, nurses, and therapists lied to us when we were vulnerable and confused children.

In his opinion piece, Cole touched on a topic that Onder also addressed during his interview with Fox News Digital: the prevalence of medical professionals warning parents that their child could harm themselves or even kill themselves if they are not allowed to undergo procedures.

“These parents are being lied to,” Onder said. “The words I hear cited again and again, by Chloé, by Luka Hein, by others, is that their parents were told: ‘Would you rather have a living son or a dead daughter?’ implying that the risk of suicide approaches 100%, but nothing could be further from the truth. It’s a complete lie,” Onder said.

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The congressman blasted the industry behind gender-specific medical procedures, questioning whether children were being pushed into doctors’ offices because of an “unhealthy ideology” or a “desire for profit.”

“Parents are being lied to, transgender clinics are being lied to, and transgender doctors are getting rich with lots of money. This is truly a despicable development in American medicine. And as a doctor, I look forward to the day when this is in our rearview mirror and children are no longer exploited,” the congressman added.

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